What is the cut off from retro to modern?

[RyaNtheSlayA]

I feel retro is more than about time. There was a definite shift in the way games play and feel starting around the PS2 generation. I wouldn't consider the Dreamcast retro either, or later PS1 games. I consider them "old" games. They're fun, but they aren't retro. I guess when/if the gameplay shifts dramatically again, I'll consider them retro.

[CRTGAMER]

There is no written rule
Perhaps a system is Retro when there are no new commercial games being made? This would put the Dreamcast at odds, with small 3rd party new releases. Maybe if the original manufacturer no longer makes a game for their console. then is it Reto?

Up to individual
Maybe Retro interpretation is based on one's age and how many consoles one has tried out? A PS2 to me is not Retro but an Atari 7800 is. Maybe the PS2 or Gamecube is considered Retro to someone who was not exposed to an earlier console?

Too much coffee I'm babbling
One thing that is amusing as well as a good thing is all the older games recycled as a cell phone or modern console download. So in a sense, maybe the current gen console and cell phone are also Retro?

[saturnfan]

My guide:

Retro - anything before NES

Classic - Everything between NES and N64

Last Gen - DC, GC, PS2 etc.

Current Gen - 360, Wii, PS3, etc.

This guide, of course, will change as time passes for obvious reasons.

[Nintendork666]

There is no written rule
Perhaps a system is Retro when there are no new commercial games being made? This would put the Dreamcast at odds, with small 3rd party new releases. Maybe if the original manufacturer no longer makes a game for their console. then is it Reto?

This is the way I look at it. Even though homebrew titles are technically 'new' games... I can't quite bring myself to consider the Genesis a non-retro console just because of Pier Solar.

Although, it would be kinda nice to pretend my beloved Dreamcast is current gen.

Up to individual
Maybe Retro interpretation is based on one's age and how many consoles one has tried out? A PS2 to me is not Retro but an Atari 7800 is. Maybe the PS2 or Gamecube is considered Retro to someone who was not exposed to an earlier console?

Maybe. I'm 20 years old, but have been gaming for the better part of 18 years now. My first console was a toploader NES, but I've played Colecovision growing up, and briefly owned an Intellivision as well.

I'd still consider GC, PS2, and XBOX retro though... despite official new games still yet to be released for PS2, which I guess sorta breaks my rule of thumb.

When it really boils down to it, any console that I feel is outdated is retro to me... all of this grey area confuses the hell outta me, especially with each addition of a new console generation, and I can't personally be bothered with it.

[shwisha]

It becomes retro when major developers cease publishing new games for the platform and Gamestop ceases selling used games for it. To me, a system becomes "retro" when it's abandoned by mainstream commerce, and its only presence is in the secondary market and/or homebrew.

Agreed.

[o.pwuaioc]

The official definition of "retro" is something like the "imitative style of the recent past," which presumably is taken to mean something not too old (so, nothing from ancient Rome or perhaps even Victorian England). A further presumption is that the style has fallen out of mainstream fashion. For me, I still see XBOX/PS2/GC as quasi-current, or not yet totally fallen out of mainstream consciousness, but little by little that goes away. I think the true defining point for those systems will be a mainstream community that has to rediscover those systems. I think the PS1 and later are really still on the cusp of current memory, and so not yet "retro". Perhaps that's because it seems weird to me to see the N64 as "retro" when I never really stopped playing it. I can't really think of a time in my life when I didn't have it hooked up (except for the short year and a half when I didn't have a TV). Even a 15 year old might still have childhood memories of an N64. Perhaps when the crop of kids born a few years ago start to hit puberty, the fifth generation will finally be truly retro system.

[Weekend_Warrior]

My guide:

Retro - anything before NES

Classic - Everything between NES and N64

Last Gen - DC, GC, PS2 etc.

Current Gen - 360, Wii, PS3, etc.

This guide, of course, will change as time passes for obvious reasons.

Yep. I pretty much agree with that list.

[D.D.D.]

When they stopped making home consoles with cartridges feels right, though with the N64/SS/PS1 generation it still feels too new to be retro.

[vlame]

i would say 2 gens back. so in that sense, DC, GBA, ps1, n64 and anything older. i don't really count the DSi games as their own gen.

[pakopako]

The official definition of "retro" is something like the "imitative style of the recent past," which presumably is taken to mean something not too old (so, nothing from ancient Rome or perhaps even Victorian England). A further presumption is that the style has fallen out of mainstream fashion.

So... after awhile a Genesis won't be "retro", but "classical" like the 2600? (Kinda like how music genres shift as modern generations pioneer newer genres; the older labels that were once "rock" become "classic rock", while music that was once "classical" becomes "baroque"...)